Chewy Fudgy Homemade Brownies.

Thick, fudgy, chewy homemade brownies made completely from scratch. You will never make a box mix again!

Greetings from the plane. Today are headed to sunny Mexico for 5 days for my best friend’s wedding. Riviera Maya – so excited to sit back with a margarita in hand and let others do the baking and cooking for me!

Everyone has a favorite brownie recipe. There are so many homemade favorites! But today I’ll show you how to make chewy, fudgy homemade brownies. Because in my dessert loving world, a brownie should be two things: chewy and fudgy.

Chewy brownies have a dense structure, but still have a little crumb. Fudgy brownies are dense, with a moist, intensely chocolatey interior – somewhere between a chocolate truffle and piece of fudge. I like my brownies so rich and dense that it tastes like frosting you can eat in bar form. Now how delicious does that sound?

Before making a batch of homemade brownies, it’s helpful to know the importance of the ingredients you’re using. I wasn’t able to develop this brownie recipe without a little practice, trial and error (delicious trial and error, might I add), and learning.

Brownie Science, Explained. (nerd alert!)

Let’s break down my indulgently rich brownie recipe real quick. A brownie’s main ingredients are chocolate, flour, sugar, and eggs. Varying amounts of these ingredients will affect the texture of the finished product.

The importance of chocolate. Brownies may be made with cocoa powder or solid chocolate. If using all cocoa powder, you typically will need more fat in the batter because cocoa powder does not contain the cocoa butter that solid chocolate does. Today, my brownie recipe uses mostly solid chocolate with a bit of cocoa powder. Double the chocolate goodness! I prefer these brownies with semi-sweet chocolate, though milk chocolate would be just fine for a sweeter tasting brownie. I don’t suggest using unsweetened or bittersweet chocolate unless you love deep, dark chocolate. My taste testers found them to be too bitter using either of those chocolate options.

You’re going to melt a precise 8 ounces of chocolate with the butter – this will help prevent the chocolate from seizing. You may either do this on the stove or in the microwave. I can’t stress the importance of accurately measuring the 8 ounces. Here is the food scale I own and highly suggest stocking your kitchen with one. The most important tool I own!

Sorry it has chocolate crumbs all over it…

Now, the flour. Like I mentioned above, I prefer my brownies chewy and fudgy! The fudginess in my brownie recipe relates to the small amount of flour. More flour = a more cake-like brownie. Cakey brownies are just not my thing; I’d rather have giant piece of chocolate cake!

Let’s talk sugar. My brownie recipe uses 3/4 cup of granulated sugar, which sweetens up the semi-sweet chocolate and unsweetened cocoa powder used. I also add 1/4 cup of brown sugar, which enhances the moist, fudgy texture. The sugars are whisked with the melted butter/chocolate mixture until completely smooth and uniform in texture.

There is very little wiggle room with the sugar. As long as you use 1 total cup of real sugar (no sugar substitutes here, please) – then your brownies will turn out wonderfully. 1 full cup of granulated sugar can be used without the addition of brown sugar. That version is just as fantastic – and easier since you only need 1 type of sugar! In fact, that’s how I usually make my brownies. But the little addition of brown sugar is welcomed these days.

Eggs do about 1 million functions in baking. From binding, to adding richness, to tenderizing, to providing structure and lift. My homemade brownie recipes uses 3 eggs, which give the brownies a tight crumb and melt-in-your-mouth tender, fudgy texture.

Because I’m completely out of my chocolate-obsessed mind, I like to add chocolate chips or chunks to the brownie batter. There is always room for more chocolate, right? The chocolate pieces inside give the brownies a little texture and will melt all over your fingers when they’re warm. Just wait until you try these homemade brownies with a little melty vanilla ice cream on the side. Perfection.

Oh, and one final touch? You can even add milk chocolate frosting because… why not?

Directions:

Melt the butter and chopped chocolate in a medium saucepan on medium heat, stirring constantly, about 5 minutes. Or melt in a medium microwave safe bowl in 20 second increments, stirring after each, in the microwave. Remove from the heat, pour into a large mixing bowl, and allow to slightly cool for 10 minutes.

Adjust the oven rack to the lower third position and preheat oven to 350F degrees. Line the bottom and sides of a 9x9 inch square baking pan* with aluminum foil or parchment, leaving an overhang on all sides. Set aside.

Whisk the granulated and brown sugars into the cooled chocolate/butter mixture. Add the eggs, one at a time, whisking until smooth after each addition. Whisk in the vanilla. Gently fold in the flour, cocoa powder, and salt. Once combined, fold in the chocolate chips.

Pour batter into the prepared baking pan and bake for 35-36 minutes or until the brownies begin to pull away from the edges of the pan. A toothpick inserted in the center should come out with only a few moist crumbs when the brownies are done. All ovens are different, so keep an eye on them after 30 minutes and use the toothpick test to see when yours are finished.

Allow the brownies to cool completely in the pan set on a wire rack. Once cooled, lift the foil out of the pan using the overhang on the sides and cut into squares. For neat squares, I use a very sharp knife and wipe it clean with a paper towel after each cut.

For the optional frosting: sift together the confectioners' sugar and cocoa powder to assure there are no lumps. Set aside. With a handheld or stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium speed until creamy - about 2 minutes. Gradually add the sifted sugar/cocoa powder alternately with the heavy cream and vanilla. Beat on low speed after each addition. Once all added, beat on high speed until creamy and combined for at least 2 minutes. Add a pinch of salt if frosting is too sweet. Frost the brownies before or after cutting into squares, whichever you prefer.

The brownies will stay fresh in an airtight container at room temperature for 1 week. Unfrosted brownies freeze well, up to 2 months.

Additional Notes:

*I love to use salted butter here. If you choose to use unsalted, don't increase the salt in the recipe. I find that there is no noticeable taste difference between using salted and unsalted butter in this particular recipe.

You may recognize this brownie recipe. I published a very similar one in my cookbook. I call them Death by Chocolate Brownies because they are just that – so intense! The only difference is that I don’t use cocoa powder or brown sugar. They’re still out of this world!

Hi Sally! I’m thinking about making these brownies for a family dinner for Oscar night this Sunday to make brownie sundaes (one of my favorite desserts!!). I wanted to know what kind/brand of cocoa powder you prefer using for your recipes. Thanks!

Made these last night. They were delicious! The only problem was that they stuck horribly to the aluminum foil. Was I supposed to grease/flour the aluminum foil? Or did I under/over bake the brownies? Thanks!

So I will add to the sea of comments that gains this post popularity. This is a very good brownie recipe. Very simple and results are yummy. But if I had to choose between this recipe and her death by chocolate brownies in her cookbook I would pick the latter. The ones in the book are far richer in flavor…tbh those are the best homemade brownies I have ever sunk my teeth into. For those who dont have a copy of her book (please buy it) this is a treat worthy recipe.

OMG i just made these brownies today to bring over to a friends house. Of course i had to try one first… It was so fudgy and chewy and delicious!! I know these will be a hit at my friends house!! Washed it all down with a glass of milk

I will say one thing i tried that worked really well for me since i dont like waiting or wasting chocolate is that i put my chocolate and butter right into the bowl i was going to be using and put it over a pot of boiling water to melt everything like a double broiler. You don’t lose any chocolate by having to transfer things to a different bowl than the one you intially melted it in. Then, because i dont like to wait i simply set that bowl into a very low filled sink or bowl filled with ice water. Just wait for 2-3 minutes instead of 10 and its all ready to add the rest of the ingredients right into the bowl.!

I had a go at these for a friend’s birthday and they were an absolute delight! Everyone loved them and they were the rich fudgy brownie they were promised to be. They weren’t overly sweet and the recipe was very easy to follow. Thank you so much for the recipe!

I doubled the recipe and found them very easy to make. They pulled away from the foil with ease after 30 minutes (used 2 different sized pans). Quite delicious and just the right amount of sweetness without frosting. I think I overcooked them just a bit since they were slightly on the “cakey” side. Can’t wait to try making them again!! Thank you for the easy to follow recipe. My first time making brownies from scratch and I’ll never go back to the box!

These brownies are PHENOMENAL ! BY FAR the BEST brownies I have ever made. I can’t emphasize this enough. I used milk Chocolate chips not semi sweet because thats what I happened to have in the house at the time. I omitted the cocoa powder and added extra chocolate. I also used only a tiny bit of brown sugar since the milk chocolate chips are already so sweet. I baked them in an 11×7 pan. They were so beautifully moist. Thank you so much for this recipe lol I have made home made brownies before but they did not turn out as REAL as these.
If they didn’t turn out as wonderfully for you then you do not know what you are doing in the kitchen although these have many good reviews I can’t see these ever not turning out for someone!

I’ve been dying to make this recipe for so long! But I ws wondering if I could somehow halve the recipe as I want to make mini brownie cupcakes and I don’t need that many. Everything looks easy to halve, except the egg; how would I halve three eggs? Would I have one full egg then just the egg white? Or would I use one full egg and beat another separately and divide it in half?

All of your recipes are deliciously amazing Sally. I use your chewy chocolate chunk cookie recipe every single time and love browsing through the wonderful range of recipes to see which delight I can whip up next. Thanks for sharing your baking genius with us all

Best brownie recipe ever. I used unsweetened bakers chocolate instead and the flavor is so deep and rich. The only thing is I had to adjust the bake time during the second batch. I followed the bake time in the recipe during the first batch and it over baked them, except for the middle of the brownies. So the next batch I baked for 25-30 mins instead. Yum!!

Just made these delish brownies!! I live at 10,000feet so some adjustments needed to be made. Increased baking temp to 375 and had to do without the cocoa powder due to not having it in the pantry. Light crispy top with a chewy fudgy middle-warning will need fork to eat

Thank you so much in advance for giving the measurements in grams as well! It can be a little off-turning when you have to convert everything to “European measurements”.
The brownies look delicious and just perfectly moist. Will try them soon but thank you so much already!
Greetings from good ol’ Germany!

I have hated homemade brownies for my entire life, I have tried countless recipes and I could just never get it to turn out right. I made these last night because I just HAD to have brownies (at midnight LOL). I’m not going to lie, my hopes were not high, but it was a brownie. I tried this and OMG it was amazing! I will never buy a box mix again, coming from me there is no higher praise. Thank you so much for sharing this recipe!

i love your blog! i followed your chewy chocolate chip cookie and it was a hit! now i tried this fudgy brownie recipe and god it smelled amazing!! the only thing that kept me from eating it all was that it was still kind of wet and mushy in the middle. i followed all your steps and instructions but i’m not sure what happened to my brownie if i leave it on for long, the topside of it will surely burn. is it possible that the pan is the culprit? do you have any suggestion on how i can make this right?